Hiking above Vallejo

Coppertone and I had spotted the trails on the ridge overlooking Vallejo when visiting a friend in the past.  After doing some online research we found the trailhead at Blue Ridge Springs Park and decided to map what we could today.

The park has ample parking, but there is sometimes a fee to get in.  Luckily, on this particular day they were not taking any entry fees.

The trail starts off with a series of switchbacks that quickly gain elevation.  Please stay on the trail here since "shortcuts" across the switchbacks greatly increase erosion on the very steep slopes here.  There's a bench near the top where one can already get a good panorama view of the city and beyond.

From this point the trail continues northwest roughly following the same elevation.  Because of a herbicide applied to the trail surface the trail from below looked like a wide jeep track or road.  But when on the trail you see the surface is mostly single track.

Traffic noise on our left was a constant companion.  On our right the ridge top varied from gentle grassy slopes to near vertical, craggy rock faces.  Occassionally the trail curves around large boulders that have calved off of the rock face and came to rest farther downhill.

We passed well above a fire station and PG&E facility that clearly had some trail segment starting at the end of Ascot Court and heading uphill, probably joining with a trail segment we passed earlier.  We made a note to come back and look for that in the future.

At our turnaround point we encountered a hiker coming from the opposite direction.  Base on his report about how much father the trail continued we decided to call it a day and double back to our starting point.  In the end, we logged just under 5 miles in total.